


The Most Unlikely of Heroes

by Echo (Lyrecho)



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Adult Fear, Ardyn never stood a chance, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Hijinks & Shenanigans, Moral Dilemmas, Religion, Worldbuilding, an au that follows The Rule of Cute, and small children doing things that no small child should ever do, carbuncle!au, especially unsupervised, featuring lesser astrals in the limelight, good dads, if the astrals were a little more proactive in the world, in which the world is saved years earlier through the power of The Cute, lore expansion, spirituality, with some actual lore and worldbuilding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-03
Updated: 2017-03-03
Packaged: 2018-09-27 19:11:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,752
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10040561
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lyrecho/pseuds/Echo
Summary: In which Carbuncle tries to make Noct friends, sets a prophecy into motion far earlier than it should have been, and the world is saved by children, lesser astrals, and the ultimate power known ascute.|Tumblr||Twitter|





	

**Author's Note:**

> this is just the carbuncle!au from my tumblr. snippets will be written there first, edited and compiled here later. updates will be both slow and cute.
> 
> this is a fun au, to help me stay in the fandom when I don't want to work on any of my big fics, so if you have a prompt or request for any shenanigans or hijinks you'd like to see the party get up to hmu either here or on tumblr (you have a better chance of getting a timely response on tumblr because i'll be writing things over there first)

So, one fine day Carbuncle is just chilling wherever it is that the lesser astrals and messengers chill when they're not running errands for the Six, feeling kind of sad that Noct hasn't called on him in a while when Pryna busts open the door (if there is a door wherever they are, I guess.)

Now, Pryna has been missing for about a week, so everyone is all, 'where were you?'

And Pryna goes, 'I met a nice kid in Insomnia. He likes dogs! He nicknamed me Tiny.' (Nicknames are very important to the lesser astrals and messengers that don't her fancy titles like 'fulgarian' or 'draconian.' There is murmuring as Pryna reveals her new nickname. Everyone is suitably impressed. Umbra just sort of...rolls his eyes. He knows it's nowhere near as impressive as Pryna is making it out to be.)

But Carbuncle perks up because of a different reason - he goes up to Pryna and asks, _Insomnia?_

Pryna smiles at him - well, as much as a dog can smile. 'Yes!' She sparkles. 'Lady Lunafreya said it was good I found him. He's a friend of Noct's!'

And now Carbuncle is _very_ intrigued - Noct is his friend too, after all.

He decides that the next chance he gets, he's going to go to Insomnia in order to spy - that is, suss out, this new friend of the Chosen King.

(Miles away, in the exact city Carbuncle is thinking of, Bahamut pauses in his super crystal reflection meditation. He had just felt a disturbance in the crystal force.

He frowns. Something Carbuncle did, great enough to change the crystal fabric of the crystal universe? That can't be right, and he would know, because he's Crystal Dragon Jesus.)

So when Carbuncle finally gets down to Insomnia, he finds a blond kid about a week away from his highschool entrance nervously trying to think up ways to introduce himself to the Prince. Its kind of sad, honestly. Carbuncle would feel embarrassed for the kid if he wasn't so intrigued about one small thing - he was planning to introduce himself to Noct, which meant they _weren't_ actually friends yet. Maybe Pryna had misunderstood Lady Lunafreya? Maybe Luna had meant they were _destined_ to be friends.

Or - gasp! What if he was one of the brothers!?!?!? Every astral knew the Chosen King had a Chosen Clique. What if the nervous blond kid that liked dogs was one of them?!?!??

Well, obviously, Carbuncle would have to do his duty as an astral, and help the Chosen King meet his Chosen Brother as soon as feasibly possible. They start school together in a week? Nope, too long to wait for _this_ astral.

So he links their dreams together...and after they realise that HOLY SHIT THIS IS REAL, he tells them about the prophecy and the Scourge, because to be good Brothers they should really know everything they're getting into.

...in hindsight - Carbuncle, please remember next time you get an 'idea' that two impressionable young fourteen year olds are not to be told they are destined to save the world and defeat the evil Accursed. It leads to _bad things_ , Carbuncle.

("How did they even get out of the city?" Drautos asked, honestly amazed. "Two kids - one of them the _Crown Prince_ , for crying out loud - and you're telling me they got past the checkpoints, outside of the wall, and through the Niflheim battlement parked on our front doorstep?"

A young Nyx Ulric, new to the glaive, shrugged, looking somewhat reluctantly impressed."I...have no idea, sir," he said honestly.)

 _If I know Carbuncle right, they'll be heading for Lunafreya,_ Bahamut intones, and Regis closes his eyes, a headache beginning to pound at his temples.

"Of course they are," he sighs. "Of course they are."

* * *

-x-

By the time Carbuncle realises that leading the boys outside of Insomnia is _maybe_ a bit of a bad idea, it is, perhaps, too late.

They'd asked to be taken to the oracle, and the guardian of dreams - caught up in the adventure of it all; the honour of a smaller, unimportant astral like himself being asked to aid the Chosen King in his quest - had agreed without thinking.

Now, they were outside of the safety of the Wall, two Brothers short, and without weapons - and even his own Ruby Light could only do so much.

So he squints at the shorter child, the blond Brother, and wonders at the sense of fire and darkness that comes from within him - and realises: _Ifrit_. The rest of the Six keep a close watch on his Messengers so he can't inhabit them like Shiva does Her Gentiana, and humans can't hold the power of an astral within them without burning out in seconds -

But the blond is one of the Brothers, and thus ultimately, automatically, destined for great things. Great...not always meaning _good_ , and with blond hair unusual to Lucian territories, he _does_ have the look of Niflheim...

Carbuncle's hackles raise - the astrals have long known that the Accursed is a) in league with Niflheim and b) in league with the Tainted Betrayer. It makes sense, then, that he would try to _combine_ the two.

But, if the blond is _really_ carrying a small piece of Ifrit's fire and taint within him...then, as much as it pains Carbuncle to admit, getting them to Tenebrae protected and safe is going to be easier than he originally worried.

He dematerializes and the boys, sitting on rocks by a river, dipping their feet into it casually and carelessly, break off their conversation about video games with dual yelps.

("Carbuncle!" Noctis calls out, and scrambles to catch his balance as he stands up without thinking and his feet slip and lose their grip on slick and polished river rocks.

Smirking at him as he flails, Prompto also seems confused, and Noctis scowls at his new friend as he straightens up.

"Where did he go?" Prompto wonders, and Noctis shrugs as he gingerly perches back down in his rock.

"He's the guardian of dreams," he points out. "He probably has way more important things to do than watch us splash around in a river."

"Huh," Prompto says, and tilts his head back. "Probably," he admits. "Hey - while we wait for him to come back, tell me more about Lady Lunafreya?")

In the Unseen Realm, time and spacial locations are a little more...negotiable than they are in the mortal world, so Carbuncle simply thinks on his location, and then he's there - however much he doesn't actually _want_ to be.

 **Go away, fox,** the one he came for snarls at him, her voice crackling like the flames of the master she still adores and is still grieving for.

Carbuncle ignores her words, and stares at the chains of ice seeded with lightning threaded into the earth that hold her down, the wild walls of wind and water that surround her on all sides, and feels sorrow - and all that more anger at Ifrit. What he's reduced this once beautiful, once goddess to; a Messenger second only to the Six themselves - it's infuriating, and _she can't even see it._

 _You're coming with me!_ he tells her. _We're going to escort the Chosen King and one of his brothers to the oracle!_

Heat fills the air, before her chains spark with electricity and the crackle of piercing frost, and she whimpers, cowering down, her feathers torn and dull. **Why,** she forces out, through gritted teeth, **would I want to help you?**

Carbuncle mewls at her sadly. He looks over the form she has clung to stubbornly over the ages even as she is broken down by the wrath of the Six turned on her in place of Their brother, again and again and again having to reform her coal dark hair and ash pale skin, all wrapped up in a gown of feathers made of cherry red embers edged with fire's flickering gold - the image of her that her beloved master had so favoured, apparently.

 _You'll help,_ he says, and steps forward hesitantly, _because you want to see Ifrit again._

She turns, and stares at him dully, eyes two dimming embers stubbornly hanging on even as they wish so desperately to just finally _die_. She always _had_ been the most eternal of them all, he supposed - the astral of rebirth, once a legend almost as large as the Six now reduced to the uncommon tale of a magically healing bird.

 **See Ifrit?** she says tiredly. **I won't be swayed by empty words. Go AWAY, Carbuncle!**

But Carbuncle is stubborn, and he needs her help - her fire and her healing - if he's going to get the boys to Tenebrae alive.

So, he summons up all his strength - all the belief the children that have dreamed with him hold as they hug plushes in the image of him close to their hearts; all the prayers of parents that want him to fight off the terrors that lurk in the realm of dreams for their children's sake - and his horn begins to emit a bright, ruby glow, wavering out on a wavelength of warmth he watches her broken form before him instinctively curl into.

Carbuncle isn't a healer, or a fighter, or even _both_ , like she is - he's just a shield; a guardian tasked with protecting the most precious of all Eos' creations - the children of the world. What this means, of course, is that with enough belief and power of prayer, Carbuncle's humble Ruby Light, meant to chase away daemons and particularly stubborn nightmares, can break through even the strongest of enchantments - even chains held in place by the will of the Six themselves.

Shiva's ice _breaks_ into so much dust and the astral of rebirth stares at him as lightning, wild and suddenly free, dances into Leviathan's wall of spiralling water.

For the first time in eons, her gaze isn't just a dull bed of banked embers - no, a fire has been resparked, and no matter how faintly, her eyes _burn._

 _I wasn't lying,_ Carbuncle says fiercely. _If you come with me, you really WILL see Ifrit again. And I won't let the Six hurt you anymore, either!_ He nods firmly, and thrusts his still glowing horn into the air like the blade of an knight's halberd. _Now come on, we need to get back to the boys before they drown each other._

Silently, and on shaky feet, she rises, stands - and then slowly, following his lead, Phoenix trails after him.


End file.
